RoHS-Lead Free

Posted:10:20 AM January 06, 2020writer: ​NextPCB

What is RoHS?

RoHS is short of the restriction of hazardous substances. RoHS is a European Union directive and put into effect on July 1, 2006, and mainly used to standardize materials and process standards for electronic and electrical products, making them more beneficial to human health and environmental protection.

RoHS is intended to restrict the use of lead, mercury, cadmium, chromium, PBBs, and PEDEs in the production process and raw materials of the electronic devices, including household appliances, information, and communications equipment, consumer products, lighting equipment, leisure and sports equipment, electrical and electronic tools, toys, medical equipment, monitoring, and control equipment, vending machines.

Lead-free in PCB

When electronic devices were first developed, components with toxic substances were often used for improving efficiency standards and reducing developmental costs. With the rapid development of science and technology in recent years, these electronic components can be created using non-toxic metals and other chemicals to protect the environment.

Lead is widely used in electronic plating, and it is the only RoHS-banned substance in the integrated circuits. So, lead-free products in the PCB industry are RoHS compliant products. For the consideration of environmental, the need for lead-free solutions in semiconductor and electronics industries has been significantly increased.

RoHS is not a quality standard, and whether the PCBs are RoHS compliant does not affect the quality of the PCBs. But the requirement of the RoHS or lead-free does have a severe impact on the PCB manufacturing and soldering process.

RoHS issues in PCB assembly

Many of package types in NextPCB are qualified as lead-free. And the RoHS or lead-free assembly process should consider some aspects of PCB manufacturing.

1.The base of the circuit boards

The surface treatment of substrates and lead-free boards should be separated from traditional PCBs that use lead-based assembly. Due to the lead-free reflow process needs high temperature, manufacturers should use the right material with high-temperature resistance, and the material can be processed multiple times under RoHS compliant conditions.

2.The RoHS compliant components

It is very important to verify the RoHS compliance of required components and make sure that there are no other prohibited materials. When customers declare the RoHS compliance of the components in the BOM list, the components provided in the kit must be RoHS compliant and lead-free.

3.Ball grid array solder

The BGA metallic solder balls need to be matched with the assembly type because there are solder joints under the BGA. And BGA will fail if the non-lead-free solder balls are exposed to lead-free reflow temperatures.

RoHS-lead free products in NextPCB

NextPCB provides PCBs which meet customers' specific needs in PCB assembly prototype or mass production while complying with RoHS regulations. In the surface finish process, Lead-free is the best choice for the surface finish of PCBs. NEXTPCB has got several certificates in surface finish, such as Lead-free HASL, Immersion Gold, OSP. Therefore, if customers need products that comply with RoHS, lead-free HASL, Immersion Gold, and OSP are the possible ways for choices depending on customers' requirements.